A Comparative Study Of The Narrative Techniques In The Representative Novels Of Woolf's Early And Middle Periods

Virginia Woolf (1882-1941) was a remarkable English modernist writer in the first half of the twentieth century. In 1988, Malcolm Bradbury commented upon Woolf's contribution to the twentieth century English literature that, "the prodigious scale and achievement of all her writing…have made her work, once accused of narrowness, seem more and more central to her own time, her intellectual world, and modern artistic ideas." Thus the studies of Woolf and her works become a hot topic for the critics and scholars in China and in foreign countries.With a general review of Woolf's literary career, her works can be divided into the early, middle and last periods. There is a consensus among critics that the two novels of her early period, such as The Voyage Out and Night and Day are traditional; while the works in her middle period are the masterpieces of the modernist novels, such as Mrs. Dalloway, To the Lighthouse and The Waves. But, do the narrative techniques used in the novels of the early period break completely with that of the middle periods? The thesis is supposed to make a comparative study——in the light of Genette's narrative theory——of the narrative techniques in the novels of Woolfs early and middle periods through examining two representative novels——The Voyage Out and To the Lighthouse, with a purpose to find out the differences and relationships between the two novels in narrative techniques. The thesis can be divided into four parts: the introduction, the theoretical perspective, the comparative analyses, and the conclusions.Part one is the general introduction to the thesis. Through the introduction, the motives for choosing the theme, the purpose and significance of the study are made clear.Part two is the discussions about the theoretical perspective of the thesis, which includes the brief discussions about the structuralist narratology, Genette's narrative theory, and the relationship between the narrative techniques and Genette's narrative theory.Part three is the main body of the thesis. It makes a comparative study of the narrative techniques in The Voyage Out and To the Lighthouse through five perspectives in Genette's narrative theory: the narrator, the narrative focalization, the narrative order, the narrative duration, and the narrative of words.Firstly, it is the comparative study of the narrator. The study of the narrator is the precondition to discuss the narrative techniques, for the structuralist narratology repels the author in a study of a narrative text. The present writer finds out that both novels are narrated by the "extradiegetic-heterodiegetic" narrator. Having determined the kind of narrator, the techniques can be considered as the narrator's manipulation of narrative focalization, narrative order, narrative duration, and narrative of words.Secondly, it is the comparative study of the narrative focalization. The present writer finds out that the narrator in The Voyage Out adopts nonfocalization to narrated the objective events, the objective description, the characters' thoughts, the comments of the narrator, and the characters' spoken words; while the narrator in To the Lighthouse adopts variable internal focalizations to narrate different characters' indirect interior monologues, and adopts the external focalization to narrate the events of the story.Thirdly, it is the comparative study of the narrative order. Through the analysis of the relationship between the narrative time and the story time, the present writer finds out that both The Voyage Out and To the Lighthouse are narrated in chronological order.Fourthly, it is the comparative study of the narrative duration. Through the analysis of the relationship between the length of the narrative time and that of the story time, the present writer finds out that the narrator adopts "scene" as the narrative duration in The Voyage Out, while the narrator adopts "pause" and "summary" as narrative duration in To the Lighthouse.Fifthly, it is the comparative study of the narrative of words. The present writer finds out that the narrator mainly uses the reported speech to present the characters' words in The Voyage Out, while the narrator mainly uses the free indirect speech to present the characters' indirect interior monologues in To the Lighthouse.Part four is the conclusions of the thesis. Through the comparative study, it not only enables us to get a clear idea of the differences and relationships in narrative techniques of Woolf's two novels, but also deepens our general insight into the true nature of the traditional and modernist novels. Because of the scope and space, the thesis does not produce a picture of a comparative study of the narrative techniques as complete as the present writer has hoped, which becomes the limitations of the thesis. With all these efforts, the thesis can do its bit for the comprehensive studies of Virginia Woolf and her novels.